


Static

by Dedicate Kiwicrocus (cranky__crocus)



Series: SMACKDOWN '11 R2, R3, Final - CIRCLECEST [20]
Category: Emelan - Tamora Pierce
Genre: F/F, Goldenlake, smackdown
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-06
Updated: 2011-06-06
Packaged: 2017-10-20 05:00:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 1,440
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/209000
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cranky__crocus/pseuds/Dedicate%20Kiwicrocus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Tris, you came!”</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Written for SMACKDOWN at Goldenlake: fiefgoldenlake.proboards.com
> 
> This is the third in my Circlecest megaship megaseries.

The second Earthsday in Mead Moon, Tris was summoned to the Duke’s Citadel, presumably to sit with Sandry. Briar and Daja had grinned at her as she left, which made her feel a touch uneasy—did they know something she did not?

            It was approaching evening-time, as well; she thought the sun might not greet her upon leaving the citadel later.

            When she reached Sandry’s study within the castle-like building, the woman did not look too put-out by the time. Instead Tris admired the petite and strong sliding shapes of Sandry’s features by the crepuscular light, which gilded everything in the room and seemed to weave the dying rays directly into Sandry’s characteristic plaits. She was looking over a pile of papers, her eyebrows pulling together in the faintest indication of a frown.

            Tris knocked twice. “Sandry?”

            Sandry smiled, slow and sweet, as she brushed her work away. “Tris, you came!”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I wanted to speak with you.”

“Sandry, I tend to come when you officially request my presence, yes,” Tris responded to Sandry’s exclamation at her arrival. She stepped farther into Sandry’s citadel study and was about to sit when Sandry stopped her.

            “Come walk with me; I’ve grown sore sitting too long.” Sandry grasped Tris’ hand and smiled, head tilted in that feminine way that only Sandry seemed to pull off, out of the four of them. “I wasn’t sure Daja and Briar would pass along the message.”

            “And risk you strangling them with their own clothes? Not the sort of thing they willingly sign up for.”

            Sandry pulled the two out of the study, her smile all innocence. “Come now, I wouldn’t do _that_ —maybe just a little tug here or there.”

            Tris laughed. Whoever believed Sandry’s innocent act was a fool. The two walked down the corridor together, Tris admiring the windows lining the hall with sea-side views along one wall. She saw a stormy petrel fly by on its way to the waves; she had studied birds with more care after Shriek, especially when Rosethorn gifted her a book on birds.

            “Sandry, as dandy as I’m sure you think this meeting is, why have you called me here?”

            “I wanted to speak with you.”

            Tris’ eyebrow rose; she was unconvinced. “And you didn’t think that would be possible during one of your frequent trips to the Cheeseman House?”

            But Sandry watched Tris’ eyes following sea birds, sea clouds, sea winds…and smiled at her stormy friend. “I could. But you don’t make time for visits nearly enough, and I thought you’d be less likely to run if you thought you might get lost.” 


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "I try not to be jealous, for it seems a trivial thing to be, but I was surprised you sought out Daja before me."

Tris stared at Sandry, eyes wide. “What could you tell me that would make me want to run rampant in a citadel and, potentially, get lost?”

            “Hopefully nothing,” Sandry responded, voice soft as she tugged at Tris’ hand. “But I apologise for my peccadillo, if bringing you here was such. I didn’t want you to topple Cheeseman over with some weather catastrophe…”

            Tris frowned and moved to pull her hand from Sandry’s grasp, but the thread mage held strong—drat the strength that came from hand-work. “Sandry, if this news is going to make me run _and_ topple my own home, please just be out with it.”

            “I wish I could,” Sandry ceded. A little line formed between her eyebrows and Tris regretted her actions immediately. “But I feel I should explain.”

            “By all means.”

            “Briar I wasn’t surprised about—” she held fast when Tris moved to remove her hand again “—and it wasn’t hard to tell. Tris, your occupation calls for the reading of books; mine calls for the reading of people.” Sandry offered an apologetic expression, which Tris accepted with a small nod. “But Daja…I try not to be jealous, for it seems a trivial thing to be, but I was surprised you sought out Daja before me.”

            “It’s not like that,” Tris croaked, this time grasping Sandry’s hand back.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Sandry, I never meant to leave you out; you forged us all."

“What was it like?” Sandry asked, eyes so full they looked ready to burst. “When you got with Daja, what was that about?”

            Tris, for a fleeing second, recognised where they were: the corridor leading to Sandry’s personal quarters.

            “Briar was about history. Daja was about…something new, something kindled out of something old. I’d never known my emotions to change in that way—it made sense, because she was the only one I hadn’t felt that way for _before_ , not until we lived together...” Tris stopped to breathe and wrap a second hand around her and Sandry’s linked fingers. “It wasn’t meant to be anything invidious, Sandry, I promise. I don’t love any of you more than another.”

            Sandry yanked them into her bedroom and closed the door. Her features were unreadable. “I haven’t known _my_ emotions to change in such a way, either, Tris. I don’t want to be left out.”

            “You mean…?”

            “We’re a _Circle_ , Tris. Together. And Gods know I’ve loved you at your most difficult and dense.”

            Tris couldn’t help a little chuckle. “Like now?”

            “Like now,” Sandry confirmed, pressing Tris up against the door. “So may I? I haven’t before—with a woman—but I’d, I’d like to. With you.”

            Tris flushed from tip to toe and wrapped one arm around Sandry’s slender waist. “Sandry, I never meant to leave you out; you forged us all. And that you’re last means little, if not that I know I’m not _experimenting_ any more. I know what I want—and with whom.”

            “Thank you, Tris.” Sandry touched her lips to Tris’.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The sheets sparked, but not as bright as Sandry’s smiles or laughter.

Sandry’s lips were all tenderness and petite movements, feminine but turning firm…it was heady to Tris, all of it. Being pushed up against Sandry’s door, Sandry’s delicate weaver’s digits stroking the fine hairs of her neck…

            Lightning jumped from Tris to Sandry, catching her on her little stubborn chin. Any other girl outwardly like Sandry would have frowned, Tris thought, but not Sandry—Sandry grinned, comfortable again. She pulled Tris backward toward the bed and Tris found, somehow, that she was without a stitch by the time she reached it; Sandry’s clothes were still slithering away.

            “Promise you won’t compare me in your mind with Daja or Briar?” Sandry questioned, gentle and without accusation. “I’m not sure I could bare it.”

            “I would never,” Tris promised, and it was true.

            Sandry’s lips were on her again, the very sheets of the bed reaching out and pulling for them until they were enveloped by soft cloth sliding about their skin.

            Tris had thought, growing up, that only a paladin of the highest honour was fit for their Sandry: stronger than five courtier boys put together, witty enough to out-step a monarch, handsome enough to be an escort, kind enough to care for any creature in need. Somehow, Tris found that lying with Sandry was perfectly comfortable despite her lack of knighthood.

            And Sandry didn’t seem to mind. Where had Tris got the impression that Sandry would be _quiet?_

            The sheets sparked, but not as bright as Sandry’s smiles or laughter.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tris laughed harder, just for Sandry, and was pleased that the woman was just as easy to rile up as in their youth.

Sandry’s room at the citadel was surprisingly simple, to Tris’ eyes. She thought all the other nobles would expect some grandiose living area for the duke’s nephew. Instead, this room reflected the simple one Sandry had kept at Discipline Cottage. Perhaps it was her way of respecting the child she had been during the years her nobility hadn’t mattered so much.

            Sandry’s hair tickled Tris’ chest. She laughed.

            “I love when you laugh,” Sandry told her, flushed and smiling. “It reminds me that me, Briar and Daja were around when you really learned how. You don’t get to see most people learn to laugh—either they do it early or never learn.”

            “I wasn’t aware that was a lesson we were taught,” Tris remarked. She toyed with one of Sandry’s plaits. “But tell me: do you ever let your courters _actually_ court you?”

            “I pretend, for the ones I really like.”

            Tris grinned. “You must not like me too much.”

            Sandry’s eyes widened. “What?”

            “You invited me here for—what would Briar call it—a booty call?”

            “I didn’t!” Sandry gainsaid, flicking Tris’ shoulder. “And I let you do the courting—it just so happened that you struck Daja and Briar first, and I got impatient. That’s all.”

            “Yes, because impatience is never a factor behind booty calls…”

            “Trisana Chandler, I will hang you from the ceiling with these sheets!”

            “Because the Lady Sandrilene fa Toren is above booty calls?”

            Sandry howled and launched her attack with tickles. Tris laughed harder, just for Sandry, and was pleased that the woman was just as easy to rile up as in their youth.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! C: I hope you enjoyed it.


End file.
